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Zot! #3 (KSP); issues 16 & 21-27
Scott McCloud's Zot! Book 3: Issues 16, 21-27
Book by Scott McCloud
176 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 1998
About the author
Scott McCloud
130 books1,584 followersScott McCloud (born Scott McLeod) is an American cartoonist and theorist on comics as a distinct literary and artistic medium.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 17, 2015
Zot, I think, falls under the category of "cerebral graphic novel", though its somewhat kiddie art style and teenage main characters might throw you off. However, it is to be noted that neither of those things mean a story can't be cerebral; just that I think people think it does. Remember Calvin and Hobbes? That was cerebral, too, and that was about a kid and his stuffed tiger. It almost seems (though don't quote me on this) that the more dark, "adult-looking", and fancy a comic or graphic novel is, the harder it is to take it seriously. Not all the time, obviously, but there's a limit for that stuff, a limit I think Batman for instance often goes past - and at a point I just can't handle that super-gloomy, super-serious shit, because it seems fake. Weirdly, almost inexplicably, the "kiddie" things, that you think are aimed at children and you think aren't supposed to be taken seriously, end up being the most effective at making you think and getting serious, grown-up ideas across to you. I still couldn't say exactly why that is, though it's possible the answer is obvious and I'm just missing it. I'll meditate on it - meanwhile, let's get into the review.
I don't have Zot! book 1. Apparently it's out of print, but still exists used (this information taken from a random source - not sure if true). If so, it's unlikely I'll ever read it, though I may scour the internet sometime in hopes for a PDF download or something. (You'd think somebody would think to do it, since I doubt Scott McCloud would care about people reading his stuff for free, thirty years after it was published, when it isn't even in print anymore.) But anyway, though I only picked up the series in book 2, I feel adequately invested in the story. True, I continue to be unable to totally love it because of how familiar it feels (every-day teenage girl is taken into a fabulous new world by a charming and interesting teenage boy), and also true that I continue to not really like the character of Jenny very much, but the comic is so good regardless that it doesn't really matter. Yeah it's not flawless, but almost nothing is. Zot is more than forgivable.
Three or four different stories are collected in this volume, the first of which is called "Can't Buy Me Love", and it's about selling out, capitalism, and the morals that go along with all that. Zot, semi-oblivious and determined to only see the good in everyone and everything (though by now he's learning how the world really is; he learned back in book 2, but I think he's trying to pretend he didn't), goes along with an advertisement deal where he's selling a crappy pop brand, and Jenny is subsequently horrified. I get her reaction, because selling out sucks and when it's somebody you're so close to I bet it would feel like betrayal, but you'd think by now she'd get that Zot doesn't know any better (or tells himself he doesn't, whatever the case may be). And other characters even tell her that, but still. I suppose in her defense she does get over it really fast, and then they go to fix the problem, so really no harm done. It's just an extension of last book's chapter on Zot going to check out Jenny's earth and being exposed to the "badness" there. Did the series need another story about that? I don't know, maybe not. But at least it's an excuse for McCloud to draw some really cool cityscapes, dark and far-removed from the clean, Jetsons-like metropolis of Zot's earth.
The art can be really fantastic. I think I explained how I felt in my last review; I was specifically blown away by the "Eyes of Dekko" chapter. In this one, it's those cityscapes that really pop out at you. And just everything in general is done so solidly - I'm always amazed by artists that draw so cleanly, with such great lines and such apparently effortless perspective; I've tried a lot of drawing in the past and those are all things I could never even begin to get down. I think this kind of super-functional but also very appealing style is undervalued a bit. It doesn't always have to be flashy and gorgeous, it can be solid and powerful, like Zot is.
Much should be said of the design of the villain 9Jack9. And not just his design, but his character. He's a technological entity that manifests as a man in an old-fashioned coat and gloves, his face an empty space with two wide eyes glowing beneath his pinstriped hat. (Just look him up; he's great.) He isn't quite as fascinating as Dekko was, but certainly more deadly. There's one panel in particular where Jack reaches an enormous gloved hand through a portal and grabs someone to pull them through, and it is one frightening panel, I tell you. I don't easily get the chills from art or animation (not after watching stuff like Coraline), but there was something very effective about that. Jack in general is a good villain. The stuff about Zot's parents being murdered by him could easily have been botched and made to feel silly and overdramatic, but McCloud avoids it by the skin of his teeth, due mostly, in my opinion, to one fantastic series of panels where Zot flies alone across the water to land on a beach and completely break down. Comics - kids' comics or otherwise - need more stuff like that. It can't all be busting robbers and flying away from exploding buildings with pretty girls in your arms, free from burns and scratches, smiling out at the reader; to have a successful story, you need that emotional stuff, the stuff that makes you uncomfortable because it isn't sugar-coated.
The 9Jack9 storyline was far removed from sugar-coated, and it amped up my respect for the series even more. That said I didn't totally enjoy the "Call of the Wild" chapter, though everyone turning into monkeys was funny (for a minute or two, anyway). The last story is "Ring in the New", and in it a whole bunch of villains get together, though luckily it isn't stupid at all - not like that apparently necessary inevitability of grouping them all together and having them fight the main character usually is. (And TV, comics, and movies do that all the time. Not so much novels, though; I guess because you lose the aesthetic in that case). So yes it could've been stupid, but it wasn't. I wondered what the heck the big deal with the pie was, and was annoyed with what McCloud could possibly do with that plot point, until it fell into Zot's face near the end. Apparently, according to the introduction, readers got to vote for who got a pie in the face. I think I know why they wanted Zot to get hit, to see his reaction, as the most overtly mild of the characters. All he did was lick his finger and proclaim what kind it was, and that was that. I sort of like how it was just put in there, for no real reason. It would've lost something if it'd been a big deal. Just smashing Zot in the face with a pie for one panel was satisfying, especially since it just moved on and forgot about it, like "Yes, that was the joke, all that buildup for that joke that lasted one panel". Odd that it worked.
I was also interested to read in the introduction that each of the Zot villains represents some aspect of society (capitalism, the rise of technology, etc.), and that Scott McCloud divides them into categories of "quiet" and "loud". To hear that they all represent big notions like capitalism is cool - I knew there was a big cerebral undertone going in Zot, but that affirmed it beyond all doubt. Whatever this series might appear to be on the surface (which is a Peter Pan superhero story for kids where people get zapped into monkeys), it's got a lot more going on below, and I love that. The best comparison I can think of is still Calvin and Hobbes. It has that same pretense of childishness, so that kids can enjoy it, but then that extra layer of profoundness that lets the adults get into it, too. It's why people like Avatar: The Last Airbender, and Harry Potter. I almost wish Zot had a bit more fame, because I think it deserves it. Yeah it has a following, but it feels like the definition of "cult". I guess I'm not surprised - it's not an easy series to categorize - like all the best stuff isn't.
4/5 for Zot! book 3.
I don't have Zot! book 1. Apparently it's out of print, but still exists used (this information taken from a random source - not sure if true). If so, it's unlikely I'll ever read it, though I may scour the internet sometime in hopes for a PDF download or something. (You'd think somebody would think to do it, since I doubt Scott McCloud would care about people reading his stuff for free, thirty years after it was published, when it isn't even in print anymore.) But anyway, though I only picked up the series in book 2, I feel adequately invested in the story. True, I continue to be unable to totally love it because of how familiar it feels (every-day teenage girl is taken into a fabulous new world by a charming and interesting teenage boy), and also true that I continue to not really like the character of Jenny very much, but the comic is so good regardless that it doesn't really matter. Yeah it's not flawless, but almost nothing is. Zot is more than forgivable.
Three or four different stories are collected in this volume, the first of which is called "Can't Buy Me Love", and it's about selling out, capitalism, and the morals that go along with all that. Zot, semi-oblivious and determined to only see the good in everyone and everything (though by now he's learning how the world really is; he learned back in book 2, but I think he's trying to pretend he didn't), goes along with an advertisement deal where he's selling a crappy pop brand, and Jenny is subsequently horrified. I get her reaction, because selling out sucks and when it's somebody you're so close to I bet it would feel like betrayal, but you'd think by now she'd get that Zot doesn't know any better (or tells himself he doesn't, whatever the case may be). And other characters even tell her that, but still. I suppose in her defense she does get over it really fast, and then they go to fix the problem, so really no harm done. It's just an extension of last book's chapter on Zot going to check out Jenny's earth and being exposed to the "badness" there. Did the series need another story about that? I don't know, maybe not. But at least it's an excuse for McCloud to draw some really cool cityscapes, dark and far-removed from the clean, Jetsons-like metropolis of Zot's earth.
The art can be really fantastic. I think I explained how I felt in my last review; I was specifically blown away by the "Eyes of Dekko" chapter. In this one, it's those cityscapes that really pop out at you. And just everything in general is done so solidly - I'm always amazed by artists that draw so cleanly, with such great lines and such apparently effortless perspective; I've tried a lot of drawing in the past and those are all things I could never even begin to get down. I think this kind of super-functional but also very appealing style is undervalued a bit. It doesn't always have to be flashy and gorgeous, it can be solid and powerful, like Zot is.
Much should be said of the design of the villain 9Jack9. And not just his design, but his character. He's a technological entity that manifests as a man in an old-fashioned coat and gloves, his face an empty space with two wide eyes glowing beneath his pinstriped hat. (Just look him up; he's great.) He isn't quite as fascinating as Dekko was, but certainly more deadly. There's one panel in particular where Jack reaches an enormous gloved hand through a portal and grabs someone to pull them through, and it is one frightening panel, I tell you. I don't easily get the chills from art or animation (not after watching stuff like Coraline), but there was something very effective about that. Jack in general is a good villain. The stuff about Zot's parents being murdered by him could easily have been botched and made to feel silly and overdramatic, but McCloud avoids it by the skin of his teeth, due mostly, in my opinion, to one fantastic series of panels where Zot flies alone across the water to land on a beach and completely break down. Comics - kids' comics or otherwise - need more stuff like that. It can't all be busting robbers and flying away from exploding buildings with pretty girls in your arms, free from burns and scratches, smiling out at the reader; to have a successful story, you need that emotional stuff, the stuff that makes you uncomfortable because it isn't sugar-coated.
The 9Jack9 storyline was far removed from sugar-coated, and it amped up my respect for the series even more. That said I didn't totally enjoy the "Call of the Wild" chapter, though everyone turning into monkeys was funny (for a minute or two, anyway). The last story is "Ring in the New", and in it a whole bunch of villains get together, though luckily it isn't stupid at all - not like that apparently necessary inevitability of grouping them all together and having them fight the main character usually is. (And TV, comics, and movies do that all the time. Not so much novels, though; I guess because you lose the aesthetic in that case). So yes it could've been stupid, but it wasn't. I wondered what the heck the big deal with the pie was, and was annoyed with what McCloud could possibly do with that plot point, until it fell into Zot's face near the end. Apparently, according to the introduction, readers got to vote for who got a pie in the face. I think I know why they wanted Zot to get hit, to see his reaction, as the most overtly mild of the characters. All he did was lick his finger and proclaim what kind it was, and that was that. I sort of like how it was just put in there, for no real reason. It would've lost something if it'd been a big deal. Just smashing Zot in the face with a pie for one panel was satisfying, especially since it just moved on and forgot about it, like "Yes, that was the joke, all that buildup for that joke that lasted one panel". Odd that it worked.
I was also interested to read in the introduction that each of the Zot villains represents some aspect of society (capitalism, the rise of technology, etc.), and that Scott McCloud divides them into categories of "quiet" and "loud". To hear that they all represent big notions like capitalism is cool - I knew there was a big cerebral undertone going in Zot, but that affirmed it beyond all doubt. Whatever this series might appear to be on the surface (which is a Peter Pan superhero story for kids where people get zapped into monkeys), it's got a lot more going on below, and I love that. The best comparison I can think of is still Calvin and Hobbes. It has that same pretense of childishness, so that kids can enjoy it, but then that extra layer of profoundness that lets the adults get into it, too. It's why people like Avatar: The Last Airbender, and Harry Potter. I almost wish Zot had a bit more fame, because I think it deserves it. Yeah it has a following, but it feels like the definition of "cult". I guess I'm not surprised - it's not an easy series to categorize - like all the best stuff isn't.
4/5 for Zot! book 3.
July 9, 2020
This is a signed edition according to the copyright page
Mine isn't and possibly none are.
Mine isn't and possibly none are.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews